Samantha and the Cowboy (9 page)

He jerked back as though she'd jabbed him. “I'm not a coward.”

“Yes, you are. You're afraid of Jake, of what he might do. Maybe he'll let you go as well.”

“He won't let me go. Unfortunately, he can't let you go,
either. At least, not right away.” He looked defeated. “I was thinking about it while I was looking for your horse. We're miles from any town. There's no place close enough for him to kick you to.”

Unwarranted relief coursed through her. She was getting a reprieve. She'd have a little more time to convince Matt to keep her secret. “So you're not going to tell him?”

“The crew knowing that you're a girl is just gonna cause trouble. I'll keep your secret until we get to a town, but then I'm telling and you're leaving.” He stepped closer until they stood toe to toe. “Until then, though, you stay the heck away from me. You're on your own.”

As the sun began to set, Matt urged his horse toward the main herd and the camp that he could see set up nearby. Beside him, Sam rode in silence. She hadn't spoken a single word since he'd stalked out of the clearing, demanding she leave him alone.

Which was exactly what he wanted. He didn't want her talking to him, looking at him, being friends with him.

How could he have been so gullible? How could he have not seen she was a girl?

Because he was certainly acutely aware of that fact now. Through the opening in her jacket, he could see the slight curves he'd never noticed before. Could remember how good it had felt to have them pressed against his chest as he'd worked to warm her.

“You'd better button up your jacket,” he ordered.

She jerked as though he'd startled her, but she quickly did as he'd said.

“You're gonna have to cut your hair soon, too. With those curls getting longer, you look”—delicate, he thought; she looked delicate and lovely—“you just don't look so much like a boy.”

She nodded. “I'll hack it off tonight. Thanks, Matt.”

“Don't thank me,” he barked. “I don't want Jake finding out that you're a girl until I'm good and ready to tell him, that's all. I have no plans to lose the respect he has for me. I've worked darned hard to earn it.”

“So have I.”

He glared at her. “I'm not saying you haven't, but you're a girl.”

“You can still respect me.”

“Not on a cattle drive, not when you've been lying to me the whole time.”

“Matt, I've told you truths as well. Not everything about me is false.”

“As far as I'm concerned it is.”

He saw a horse kicking up dust and recognized its rider. Jake. Matt took a deep calming breath as the trail boss drew his horse to a halt. Matt knew he ought to be up front with Jake and reveal the truth, but he figured Jake would not only send Sam back, he'd make Matt go with her. And he needed to get her as far away from him as possible, as quickly as possible. At least until his temper died down and he could think straight.

“Took you long enough,” Jake said. “Sam, anything broken?”

“Nothing,” Matt replied before Sam could. Nothing broken except trust. “Sam was just a little shaken, so we
took our time getting back.”

“The best thing to do is just get back in the saddle,” Jake told Sam.

Sam nodded. “That's what I aim to do, sir.”

Matt wondered if Sam's voice had always sounded that soft. Or was he simply listening to Sam differently, looking at her with a clearer vision? The way her cheeks blushed when Jake spoke to her, the gentle arch of her eyebrows…and that mouth, that lying mouth that had definitely been shaped with kissing in mind.

Now, where had that thought come from?

“Matt?”

He jerked his gaze to Jake. “What?”

“You just looked like you were staring at nothing. Did you get hurt? Maybe take a kick to the head?”

Staring at nothing?
He thought he might have been staring at the loveliest girl he'd ever laid eyes on. He shook his head briskly. “No, sir. Just got a little wet.”

“Good. You two can take first watch,” Jake said.

“Jake, I was just thinking that maybe Sam ought to…” Ought to what? “Ride with some other fella” was on the tip of his tongue, but what sort of trail hand would he be to place someone else in danger? Sam was his responsibility, more so now than ever.

Besides, Jake was glaring at him, waiting for some excuse that Matt couldn't form. “I think maybe Sam ought to rest up tonight. I'll take two watches to make up for
someone else having to ride with me.”

“All right. That's probably a good idea.” Jake kicked his horse's flanks and the animal loped away.

“What in the heck did you do that for?” Sam asked.

“I figured you might still be shaken. A nervous rider can spook a cow and start a stampede.”

“I'm not a nervous rider,” Sam protested.

“Just take the night off,” Matt ordered, “or I'll tell Jake the truth this very minute.”

“I don't want you doing my share of the work.”

“I won't. It's just that it's been a long day. Everyone will understand if you don't take a watch tonight. Let's get some grub.” He urged his horse forward.

“Matt?”

He glanced over his shoulder and realized that there wasn't a solitary thing about Sam that resembled a boy. He could only hope that Jake didn't realize the truth before he had a chance to tell him.

“I never thanked you for coming to my rescue, for saving me from drowning.”

He could do little more than nod brusquely and wonder who was going to save him from drowning within the green depths of her eyes.

 

Sam's favorite part of the evening came shortly after supper. The hands would begin settling in for the night. A couple of them brought out their harmonicas. Mouth
organs, they called them. Sometimes they would play a familiar tune and one or two of the hands might provide the words. Sam often thought of singing, but she feared one of the men might listen more intently to her voice than Matt did when they were watching the cattle. Someone might realize she was a girl.

Someone besides Matt, that was. He had given her a bit of a reprieve and she intended to put the time to good use. She had no plans to leave this trail drive when Matt finally revealed her secret. She was determined to continue making herself useful and proving herself. Eventually, she would be needed to such a degree that Jake wouldn't think he could go on without her. She hadn't worked as hard as she had or suffered for as long as she had just so she could give it all up without a fight.

What sorts of dangers could there be? She hadn't caused anything to happen in the six weeks before this afternoon. Why would anything happen now?

With her back against the tree, she drew her knees up against her chest and wrapped her arms around her legs. She studied the men moving about camp. Some were only a little older than she was. Others looked considerably older. All gave her respect—because she was a hard worker, and because they thought she was a boy. Would it bother them to learn she was a girl?

She knew that it would. If she'd thought otherwise, she wouldn't have signed on under false pretenses to begin
with. She wouldn't have chopped off her hair.

She supposed that Matt had a right to be angry. His reputation with the men—especially with Jake—was on the line. They probably would think he was gullible when they found out that she had convinced him she was a boy—convinced them all.

She tried not to remember how nice it had felt to be pressed against him this afternoon. His body had been warm, his arms strong.

She'd been struggling within the churning water, almost in a panic. Until she'd heard his voice, caught sight of him scrambling across the backs of the cows. Coming to her rescue.

She'd known without a doubt then that she'd be all right. Matt would save her.

She supposed she owed him. She figured that the decent thing to do would be to pack up her belongings and leave quietly, peacefully, before he had to tell anyone, before he had to embarrass himself. She could just drift away into the night, never to be heard from again. Years from now, on other cattle drives, the cowboys would talk about that boy Sam who had turned into a first-rate cowpuncher…and then was gone. Like smoke blowing away into the dark.

If only she didn't need a hundred dollars so badly, she might leave. If only her family wasn't depending on her. Then maybe she could spare Matt the embarrassment.

As it was, she would have to risk it, risk everything, on the slight chance that when all was said and done, Jake, and even Matt, would see her as a dependable cowboy—instead of a troublesome girl.

 

The Big Dipper had rotated around so it hung beneath the North Star by the time that Matt wandered into camp following his second shift. He was bone-weary and dead tired. Rescuing Sam had taken more out of him than he'd realized. He was glad that he'd suggested she stay in camp tonight. She had to be more exhausted than he was.

Her panic had been more evident, her fear more obvious.

He pulled his bedroll out of the back of the wagon and slowly let his gaze circle the clearing, identifying the trail hands who were stretched out sleeping. He spotted Sam and his breath backed up in his lungs.

She reminded him of a lonely, little kitten, curled up so far from the others. He understood now why she'd kept herself aloof. She must have constantly worried that she'd give herself away.

He considered sleeping on the opposite side of the camp from her, but folks would wonder what had happened between them, why he was suddenly avoiding her. So he couldn't take that approach. He'd just have to steel himself against noticing her. He'd just have to pretend that she was a boy.

But as he crossed the camp and crouched beside her, he knew that task was going to be impossible. Lying on her side, she had one hand pressed beneath her cheek and the other resting against her stomach. She had such delicate-looking hands.

Her hands intrigued him because he also knew they were capable. She could guide her horse, herd the cattle. A couple of her nails were chipped and broken. It might have happened when she was saddling her horse or gathering wood for the fire. How had she managed to heft the saddle onto her horse's back?

In sleep, she'd parted her mouth slightly, but she didn't snore, like all the other fellas. She was quiet. If any breath passed between her lips at all, it was silent. He wondered if those lips felt as soft as they looked.

Her eyelashes fluttered, and then she opened her eyes. The night shadows hid the green depths from him, but still he knew they were there, knew the exact shade.

“What are you doing?” she asked in a sleepy voice that slammed hard into his gut.

“Figured I'd best bed down beside you so the fellas don't start asking me why I'm mad enough to spit nails, avoiding you,” he explained as he quickly went about setting up his bedroll. “We just have to pretend nothing has changed.”

And that was going to be close to impossible, he thought, as he stretched out beside her. He went to toe off
his boots and froze. Lying beside a girl with socks showing seemed incredibly intimate, even though he'd done it close to forty nights already. Somehow, he couldn't bring himself to do it tonight.

He glanced down at her feet. She was still wearing her boots as well. He shoved his hands beneath his head and glared at the sky. He was so tired that he should have had no trouble getting to sleep. As it was, he was wound up tighter than a rope tossed around an escaping calf and jerked taut.

“Matt, I'm sorry,” she said softly.

Her voice went right through him, reached out to touch all the lonely spots. That ability of hers to make him want to protect her irritated the devil out of him. “It's a little late for sorry.”

“Haven't you ever done something that you didn't want to do, but you knew you had to do it?”

He ground his teeth together, trying not to think about the war, the many things he'd done that he hadn't wanted to do. The fields he'd marched out onto, the bullets he'd fired, the enemy he'd killed.

“Matt, I know you're honorable and anything you've done you've done because you thought it was best at the time.”

He turned his head and stared at her. “Sam, you're not going to sweet-talk me into changing my mind. It's because I'm trying to look after you that I have to tell Jake the truth
when the time is right.”

“My sister Amy has never worn a dress that I didn't wear first. My brother Nate goes to bed hungry. My ma is all hunched over with the burdens she carries.”

He turned his attention back to the stars. He didn't want to hear the unspoken plea in her voice to hold her secret close to his chest and not tell anyone.

“Matt, you've told me repeatedly that I was doing a good job. I'm not going to stop working hard. I didn't just suddenly turn into a girl this afternoon.”

“You sure as heck did as far as I'm concerned.” He rolled onto his side and faced her. “Sam, a cattle drive is no place for a girl. Look at what happened today.”

“Are you saying that no cow
boy
ever slid off his horse into the river?”

“What I'm saying is that Jake made you my responsibility and taking care of a
girl
is not what I signed up to do!” he hissed through clenched teeth. “Now, go to sleep before I decide to tell Jake the truth at sunup.”

Her eyes shot daggers at him before she turned and gave him her back. A slender back. He remembered how dainty she'd felt in his arms. He did not want to think about the frailty of her bones or the warmth of her skin.

He didn't want to remember holding her…and he sure as heck didn't want to wonder what it would feel like to kiss her, to plant his mouth against hers…

Frustrated by his wandering thoughts, he rolled onto
his side and glared at the small fire in the center of camp. His body was growing as hot as the flames.

If the river had been within walking distance, he'd have headed for it and dived headfirst into it.

As it was, he stayed awake all night thinking about Sam the
girl
and wishing that he didn't have to tell Jake the truth.

But he had to. Keeping the truth to himself wasn't fair to Jake, the men, or the Broken Heart ranch.